Tunisians are casting ballots in their North African country's second democratic presidential election, choosing among 26 candidates for a leader who can safeguard its young democracy and tackle its unemployment, corruption and economic despair.

Thousands of demonstrators chanted slogans and marched through a downtown Hong Kong shopping district on Sunday in defiance of a police ban, as shops shuttered amid fears of renewed violence in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory that has been unsettled by months of protests.